The invention relates generally to weatherstrips for motor vehicles and more particularly to weatherstrips, beltstrips and door seals for motor vehicles having a metal core or carrier exhibiting lineal regions of diverse rigidity and compressibility.
Weatherstrips and beltstrips have long been utilized by automobile manufacturers to seal between a fixed or movable glass light and the adjacent vehicle panel such as a door or door frame. Generally speaking, a weatherstrip refers to that portion of the seal extending vertically up one side of a window light, across the upper portion and down the opposite side. Typically as well, these weatherstrips extend well into the door to serve as tracks or rows for the window when it is lowered and retracted into the door. A beltstrip refers to that sealing component which extends across the lower portion of the window opening from one vertical edge of the opening to the other and seals and aesthetically finishes the region between the door and the window light. A door seal, as the name suggests, refers to the seal between a door and the vehicle body.
Particularly with regard to the weatherstrip, many competing engineering and aesthetic demands must be considered. Perhaps of greatest importance is the necessity to achieve an air and water tight seal around the glass and between the weatherstrip and the door frame such that both the ingress of water and the generation of wind noise are completely eliminated. Second of all, the weatherstrip must provide an aesthetically pleasing appearance to the door frame. Thirdly, it must conform to both the shape of the door frame and the glass and provide a suitable and uniform track in which the glass is received and translates.
One of the challenges of the last consideration is the desire to provide significant rigidity to the weatherstrip in regions where the weatherstrip it is substantially straight such as the front and back vertical runs as well as the upper horizontal run and also permit the bending or forming of the weatherstrip to conform to corners of the window and window frame and any other curves or non-linear portions of the window and frame dictated by aesthetics or mechanical considerations.
In the past, such weatherstrips have frequently been fabricated of an internal metal core and outer molded elastomeric material. To accommodate the straight and curved sections, the metallic core was assembled from a plurality of short sections having a desired flexibility or rigidity.
The present invention represents a significant improvement over such weatherstrips or beltstrips having cores assembled from a plurality of sections.